Changeover
by Snoaz
Summary: Personality switches are not the worst thing that can happen to a person. Then again, it isn't the most brilliant thing either. Oldrival / Special / Mangaquest / Frantic.


**A/N:**

**Warning for mild crack and the occasional cussing. Partly inspired by Silver Pard's _Adaption_.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon. Perhaps you should be glad I didn't, after reading this? :D**

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* * *

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Changeover

"Hey Green! Hey Red."

Both boys turned to face the incoming girl, red skirt and light-blue tank top present as ever. When the brunette had their attention, she continued in a bright voice, "So, I just had a rather good idea. Green–"

He mentally braced himself for money pleading / puppy eyes / blackmail –

"I'd like to work in Professor Oak's lab."

Okay, so that was unexpected.

"Come again?"

"It's obviously a really great learning experience; not to mention that I'll be able to help so many people in that position!"

Red rather accurately voiced his sentiments when he said, "That's really great, Blue, but since when do you – eh – _help _people?"

The girl frowned at his doubt, but as she opened her mouth to respond –

"Oh! A Meowth!"

Before either of them could so much as twirl their heads in the direction of the cat Pokémon, strolling leisurely in a patch of grass not too far from them, Blue had grabbed a pokéball out of her bag; slung her foot in the air; and thrown the catching device with frighteningly full-fledged experience at the unsuspecting Pokémon.

Both Red's and Green's mouth hung open. Green could only numbly think that,

1. You shouldn't wear skirts when kicking your legs in the air, and  
2. What. The. _Fuck. _

Blue hurried over to the pokéball to retrieve her latest catch, and returned with an accomplished smile.

"Well, that went rather well." Green wondered just when bragging had died and modesty had become the new modus operandi. "I'll be going to the professor's now to inform about a possible job. Catch you two later!"

And she took off with a bright step. Both boys watched her leave. Then Red said, "Is is just me, or was that really weird?"

"No. It's not just you."

"And… did she just not wink or beg for a whole ten minutes?"

"Hmm. She really didn't."

Green never thought he'd say it, but – could someone _please _bring the old obnoxious Blue back?

* * *

"Hai Gold; hey Silver! What's up?"

Both boys momentarily looked up from their all-consuming, all-important battle; except that there was one thing more important than crushing Silver, and that something happened to be walking hip-swingingly towards them.

– wait, hip-swingingly? Darn that Crobat's poison gas. Making you see hallucinations and whatnot… even though it went without saying this one wasn't particularly to be minded. Heh.

"What have you got there?"

Silver's monotone voice shook him out of his wondrous day-dream, and brought his attention to the box of strawberries in Crystal's hands.

"Wait, strawberries?" he blurted out before Super Serious Gal could open her mouth to answer. "I thought you hated them! You always said so when I offered to share them with you!"

"I got a sudden urge for them, though," she answered, and picked a strawberry from the box as if to proof her point.

Gold could feel his eyeballs pop out of their sockets as Crystal put one red fruit half into her mouth and bit on it of with closed eyes.

Holy shit. Since when had eating strawberries become synonymous with watching certain not-to-be-named movies? No, more importantly, when had _Crystal _become into eating like a high-class actress in said movies?

Silver, apparently unaffected by this display of awesome wonder, decided to play boring and ask, "Where did you get them?"

"Elm's." She smiled sleekly. "Figured I needed them more than he did, hohoho!"

Silver's brow rose a little upon witnessing a canny imitation of a certain hot sister of his (ehm – certain _normal _sister, Gold corrected swiftly, by now having sufficient proof that the redhead next to him had the ability of mind reading) but then, his friend slash rival's expression turned thoughtful. "Hmm. You picked the lock on the second door and then crawled further to avoid the cameras?"

"Yup, that's right."

Gold stared blankly from Pigtail Girl to Redhead, wondering just when this had become a gathering for experts at dodging the law.

Well, wondering mostly about Pigtail Girl, really. It was common knowledge that he and Silver were downright punks: falsifying police posters, underage gambling, breaking into New Bark Town's lab to steal a Pokémon in order to fight a masked creep and find out stuff about some bird who'd kidnapped your sis…

Oh, wait, Kris was talking.

"…so, I also quit my job at the lab, because God, really, why was I even working there? Dull as I don't know what. I'd rather be a model." She grinned, and then said sleekly, "I'm skilled enough, wouldn't you think?"

Gold gawked. Just, what the _fuck _was happening here? Kris quitting her job at the lab? That was wrong. That was like having no Lavaridge Cookies in the storage room. No, worse: that was like having no freaking _Cinnabar Burgers _in the freaking _fridge_. Kris couldn't change her lab coat for bikinis, because –

Wait, bikinis?

…okay, so, that might not be so bad after all.

"Well, I'll leave you two to your battle. May the – ah – best win." She winked, and then turned around.

Gold's mouth hung open. He was pretty sure that, had Silver been capable of doing so, his eyes would be popping out of their sockets too.

"Silver?" He watched Kris's hips shake from left to right as if they'd never known anything else. "…feel free to use that poison gas again whenever you want."

* * *

"Maybe Blue just needed coffee or something, haha."

"I doubt it," Green replied, releasing his Ninetales from its pokéball. "Now, let's –"

He never came to finish his sentence, because at that exact moment a blond-haired girl appeared in their vision and Red exclaimed in a bright voice, "Ah, Yellow!"

Well, that was just great. He could forget about that battle now.

Red's expression had turned from battle mode to flustered delight in less than a second; something the boy himself, of course, was perfectly unaware of. Obliviousness tended to reach whole new dimensions with Red.

"Well, I'll leave you to it," Green said, not wanting to pain himself with the mutual awkwardness that was bound to follow. Just as he reached for his pokéball to return Ninetales, however, Yellow came running towards him.

"Green, let's battle!"

There were two reasons for Green's initial inability to answer. One: Yellow didn't run or shout. Two: Yellow did not want to battle. Ever.

Red, blissfully unaware of the oddities of the moment (frankly, _he _hadn't experienced the whole how-to-catch-a-caterpie episode) had got sparkling eyes the moment his ears registered 'battle'.

"Green was just about to leave, but you can battle me instead, Yellow!"

The blonde seemed to be quite happy with the arrangement.

Well, of _course_.

She reached for her pokéballs, face determined and fired-up, but at the last moment appeared to have a change of mind. "Wait – first havta dump this."

Any questions relating to Yellow's new talking mode soon faded into the background as Yellow swung her hat off, revealing a shiny blond ponytail. Her belt, turn-up dress and boots were next.

Green, taking in the slightly unsettling image of Yellow dressed only in shirt and pants, wondered whether Red had been onto something after all. He needed to check what was wrong with the coffee served in Pallet.

Frankly, Red was worse off than any of the two crazy females that might or might not be drugged; he looked so flustered Green was worried he would pass out any minute. Still, being the Trainer that he was, he brought his hands to his mouth and shouted, "Don't let yourself be distracted, Red! Just start the battle!"

Immediately after the words were uttered, the rather unsettling thought popped up in his mind whether all this crazy behaviour really _was _a form of distraction. If that was the case, Green sincerely hoped word hadn't caught Blue yet – he feared her way of stripping might be slightly more effective than Yellow's.

Red seemed to recover his senses, and called out his first Pokémon. For a moment there, Green had the foolish hope that everything would be normal again.

Then Yellow lowered herself on all fours, and Green decided to never trust the universe again.

In the following twenty minutes, the girl proceeded to beat Red in a new time record; probably more so because Red was too dazed and distracted to function properly, than because of Yellow's skills and class in battle.

Afterwards, she thumped the Champion heartily on the back, as if to say, "Next time, try harder.'

Red didn't have any words to say and merely gawked at the retreating figure of Yellow, who had resumed her newly favourite position of being on all fours.

Green replied with a silence that said, "Yes, I don't know what that was about either. Now let's battle."

* * *

It was a very pleasant, peaceful day. It was just him and Wally, but the other boy was occupying himself with laying in the grass and absorbing the sunshine as if he hadn't seen the day light for years (what, come to think of it, might be true) so nobody was making a nuisance out of himself. Which was rather nice, because he was sewing a new cape for Coco – pink, with stitches of shining purple – and that project needed all of his attention.

Of course, the precious equilibrium of peace and stillness couldn't last long. Because then, just as he had completed the second row of stitches –

"Hey, there's Sapphire!"

Ruby wondered with a low growl why Wally sounded so happy whilst saying that, because didn't he know that the arrival of said female would mess up his work? And probably would bring with it some completely ungrounded and unfair bashing at his wonderful creation-to-be as well?

Not that he cared about that. Just, _really_.

Sapphire smiled at them as she arrived, fumbling with her hair. Ruby didn't see any of this, however, because his gaze was still fixed on the Pink Coat. Not lifting his eyes from the work, he prompted indifferently, "Are you here to battle, Sapphire?"

Not that he needed to ask, because the answer was _always _yes. It was either battle or bashing, and he wasn't interested in both. Though, if one had to choose, the latter was always to be preferred above the first. Words didn't mess up one's clothing, after all.

"Battling? Oh-h, no… I wouldn't want to hurt the Pokémon…"

See, that was what he meant. Always –

_Wait, what? _

Ruby's eyes flew up, taking in the demure-looking figure (yes, _demure_) of Sapphire. "What do you mean, you don't want to hurt the Pokémon? You don't _do _else. That's the reason I call you a barbarian, you know – amongst other things."

Sapphire's eyes widened. Ruby's did, too.

"Is this a joke to make me lower my guard?"

"N-no," Sapphire stuttered, looking upset, "I just don't want to battle… is that… a problem?"

Ruby blinked, and blinked again, and then started to beam. "A _problem_? On the contrary, Sapphire, I couldn't be more delighted! You've finally seen the light! You realise what a momentum and a miracle this is, don't you?" he added conspiratorially in the direction of Wally. The boy just smiled sheepishly, seemingly not wanting to come in-between either of them.

A wise decision, on the whole.

"So, you're going to enter into contests now, Sapph?" Ruby asked with a little too much hope in his voice, directing his attention to the potentially ex-cave girl.

"Oh – no, I don't think I…" Sapphire trailed off.

Well, it had been good while it lasted.

Ruby gave Sapphire a pitying look, as if to say, 'you don't know what you're missing out on,' but then, taking in her outfit with the eyes of a connoisseur, prompted, "I'm glad to see you're not wearing your leaf outfit, in any case. These clothes do a lot more for your figure."

Sapphire's face immediately took on the colour of overly-ripe Tomato berries. Ruby raised an eyebrow and wondered what kept the _What-do-you-mean-I-look-nice_? _I-don't-need-advice-from-prissies__!-_rant_._

Apparently it had taken a day off, because the next ten seconds gave only way to more blushing and more fumbling.

Well, that was just fantastic. Odd, admittedly – but fantastic.

(It was not as if he missed her rants or something. Just… _come on_.)

Sapphire balanced on the heels of her feet for a few moments, as if trying to say something but not knowing how to; then, she merely gave a small, altogether much too sweet and innocent a smile, and bade them farewell.

His mouth was not hanging ever-so-slightly open as he watched her walk away. Wally was _also _not asking what had happened to the old Sapphire.

Because, frankly_, _denial was any time better than admitting he kind of really missed that old Sapphire.

* * *

In a café somewhere in Kanto, six boys were feeling very confused.

"My theory is, they didn't have their morning coffee," Red offered.

"More like the _wrong _morning coffee," Green corrected darkly, still intending to do a background check on Pallet's hospitality business.

"You mean they were poisoned?" Gold asked with something close to awe in his voice. "Nah," he continued to answer his own question, "such a venom don't exist. It was really _that _guy's poison gas that made me imagine Crystal's hips to be swinging." He pointed a finger towards Silver.

Upon four blank stares and one very unfriendly scowl, he elaborated hastily, "Eh, his _Crobat's _poison gas, I mean. Obviously."

Silver's expression didn't waver when he snarled, "My Crobat didn't do anything, you _moron_. Crystal was _really _walking with her hips –"

"– what, you noticed?"

"Of course I did, you dumbass, it'd be kind of hard _not _to –"

Green reached for his head in frustration; both boys fell silent as if on cue.

"We don't gain _anything _by your high-quality dialogue, so if that was the illusion you were under, I'm sorry to awaken you from it. We could _better _be spending our time on finding out the reason behind this weirdness."

Five heads turned to Ruby, being the only one who hadn't said anything yet.

(For some reason, it was being taken for granted Wally would remain silent.)

Ruby raised an eyebrow, then moved his hand to remove a bit of fluff from his shirt. His face remained impassive and his voice indifferent, when he remarked, "It could be anything with Sapphire, really. Eaten a rotten berry; received a poisonous sting from a Pokémon she was trying to fight." He paused, then added, "Having been exposed a life long to mud."

The six boys were silent for awhile, reliving the encounters previously that day – with some more engrossed with the reasons behind the sudden change in behaviour than others.

(Gold was beginning to show mild symptoms of drooling.)

Then Red said, in a half-hearted attempt to lighten the mood, "Well, at least I have found a new battle mate!"

"Good," Green answered, "that will save me the effort of battling you all the time. Plus, with that girl now working at the Lab, I'll have seas of time. No more unannounced visits, what a relief..."

"Crystal will be _awesome _as a bikini model," Gold contributed, in a tone that was fifty percent dreaminess, and fifty percent something else.

Ruby sighed. "No more battles with Sapph and her wild Pokémon. I cannot believe that day has _finally _arrived."

Wally smiled weakly in agreement.

Silver's forehead frowned imperceptibly.

And all wondered if tomorrow, everything could be please back to normal again.

* * *

**A/N:**

**I realise Emerald didn't have an appearance, but I traded him for Wally; figured the kid could use some attention. (No, it has nothing at all to do with personal preferences. How do you even get by that? :D)**

**And it wasn't too hard to realise who switched personalities with whom, right? Or I really failed at that part, haha. Well, hope you enjoyed all the same. :)  
**

**~Snoaz  
**


End file.
